Hospital Cited on Transplant Documentation

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

For the second time this year a Pennsylvania hospital has been cited by state surveyors for failing to properly document organ donations from deceased patients.
In a June 4 report recently made public by the state Health Department surveyors faulted the Evangelical Community Hospital in Lewisburg for failing to have required documentation of transplants from deceased donors to a local organ bank.
The report notes that similar deficiencies had been cited in a January report on the hospital.
Despite submitting a plan of correction in January designed to prevent repeat citations, similar deficiencies were found again in June.
The 162-bed facility "failed to correct its deficient practices related to organ procurement documentation and failed to implement the plan of correction as submitted by the facility and approved by the department," the report states.
Files in three of three cases reviewed had deficiencies, according to the surveyors. Evangelical isn't alone. UPMC Muncy was also recently cited for transplant program deficiencies.
An Evangelical Hospital spokeswoman, Deanna Hollenbach, said the hospital did follow proper procedures.
"The June report from the Department of Health refers to a documentation issue where the proper paperwork was completed and processed but not scanned into the patient chart," Hollenbach wrote in an email response to questions. "All actual organ/tissue donations were done as required by law and all referrals were made," she added.
As it did in January, the hospital's plan of correction calls for staff to be re-educated on transplant record requirements.
The recent deficiencies were noted in three patients, two who died in March with one more in May.
The facility "failed to complete the certificate of referral in three of three medical records reviewed," the report states.
"All Gift of Life referrals will be kept by the nursing supervisor," the plan of correction states.
A month earlier UPMC Muncy was cited for failing to have a signed consent form in the record of a deceased patient whose eyes and skin were donated to an organ procurement agency.
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